It was about this time last year that I started EC for real, with my then 4 month old son. I caught a pee ater a nap one day and there it began. A few months later I was regularly catching all the night time pees, and many of the day time pees and sometimes a poop. I could pee him in a public restroom, or outside. I peed him in a parking lot on vacation. Things were going great. He still wore diapers most of the time, but we used less of them and we thought we were on our way to diaper freedom. At this time, however, I was doing most of the peeing and my husband rarely got our son to pee in a potty.
Then around 9 or 10 months it all changed and my son suddenly HATED the potty. Hated it SO much. I tried using different potties, different positions, tried the sink, tried it outside, tried everything. Nope, he was having none of it. By 12 months old we caught about one pee a week, on a good week. It was tough. At the same time, the once easy diaper changes also became horrible for him. So not only was pottying super hard, diaper changes were super hard. And my once, dry-through-the-night boy, stated wetting the bed.
I gave up and put him in disposables during the night, which he would soak by morning. But I didn't give up entirely. I still kept him in cloth diapers during the day and changed them as soon as he wet them. And I didn't give p on the potty, but would only try the potty once in the morning. I figured that as soon as he started going in the potty once a day, I could expand it more. I also feared that it was all over and that we'd have him in diapers for years.
But then it changed again, around 14 months when he learned how to walk well, he suddenly didn't mind the potty so much. I did a couple days of naked time and quickly brought him to the potty when he started to pee. This got him back on track to using the potty. We started catching the morning pees, and when I say "we," I really mean that both me and my husband could do it. Shortly after this we started catching the after nap pee too. And he started staying dry through the night again, so we gave up the night time disposable.
He's now 16 months old and although I've tried to catch other pees at different times and even tried catching poops when I suspect they are on their way, I have been unsuccessful. For now I am content to catch two pees a day and continue to change his cloth diapers as soon as they are wet.
At the time, I was so confused as to what was going on, but looking back this long potty pause was a developmental potty pause for learning to walk. He was starting to stand a little at 10 months and took his first steps at 12 months and perfected walking a little after 14 months. This was exactly when the potty pause began and ended. It was a long one and one we haven't quite recovered from.
We've also come to learn that our son is a very determined and persistent boy with lots of energy. He was a relatively easy younger baby, but has grown into a young boy with a more challenging temperament. I feel like I'm waiting for a window of opportunity to put it all together and throw the diapers out (or into basement storage). EC definitely did not go as expected, but we still benefited from it greatly.
Our son had diaper rash ONE time, when he was 3 months old, before we even started EC. This was when he got his first cold and had diarrhea with it. That was it, no more rash, ever. If you want to prevent diaper rash, use cloth and change them as soon as they are wet and let that butt get some air sometimes too. EC takes care of all of this. Diaper rash is not inevitable.
We also are very aware of our son's elimination patterns because we check him often and have looked for the signs for so long. I sometimes know when he is peeing, but not enough in advance to get him to the potty. We learned very early on that he doesn't pee while asleep. Hint, most babies do NOT pee while asleep, they wake up to pee, which can often explain some of the night wakings when they are young. We were ahead of the game by bringing him to a potty when he woke up. Co-sleeping helped a lot. Ironically I believe that co-sleeping has led to less wet beds over all because of my awareness of his need to pee. I would not have been aware of this need had he been apart from me. The handful of times he's gotten our bed wet I bet in no way amounts to the typical amount of crib sheet soakings.
It's also been a great comfort to me, who is a pretty anxious mother, because I know I'm keeping him as comfortable as a can and trying my best to address his need to pee and poop. Our son as not very troubled by peeing or pooping on him self, but some babies are sensitive to it. If you have a fussy baby and don't know why they are fussing, you should think about whether they might need to pee. It's entirely possible that you have a baby that doesn't like to go in a diaper and then you can be one of those lucky ones who are diaper free much earlier than the rest.
So, I'll keep you posted on our quest to end diaper use. My hope is by the end of the year, but part of me thinks it will take a few more months past then. If we've made little progress by 20 months I'm going to invest in a copy of Oh Crap Potty Training, which I've heard great things about. You can find it at http://www.jamieglowacki.com/
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